Cleo

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT CLEO - PAGE 5

On Oct. 17, Nancy OthM-sn and Ken Kaye wrote an article on Hurricane Irene in your paper. They included a list of hurricanes to strike South Florida since 1906. How can they leave out Hurricane Cleo? On Aug. 26 and 27, 1964, the eye of this storm passed directly over Plantation. I have an 80-page booklet, published and sold by the Fort Lauderdale News and Sun-Sentinel containing many pictures of the results of this storm. How is it possible to leave out Hurricane Cleo in your list of storms that have targeted South Florida?

Services will be on Monday for Cleo A. White, a longtime Broward County resident. Mrs. White, 86, of Fort Lauderdale died on Friday. She moved to Broward County from Leesburg 41 years ago. She was a member of First Christian Church of Fort Lauderdale and was a former sales representative for Lerner`s. Mrs. White is survived by two daughters, Cleo M. Schaller of Fort Lauderdale and JoeAnn Tellefson of Peoria, Ill.; a brother, Leon Tompkins of Blackshear, Ga.; a sister, Donna Frye of Fort Lauderdale; and three grandchildren.

After an outstanding concert last year, the ever-pleasing Cleo Laine returns for an encore performance on Monday at the Coral Gables Congregational Church. Laine is singing as well as ever, with a voice that seems to defy age and gravity itself. She'll be assisted, as always, by her music director and husband, saxophonist John Dankworth. The concert begins at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20 in advance, $25 at the door. The church is at 3010 DeSoto Blvd., Coral Gables. Call 305-448-7421. * O'Hara's Pub in Fort Lauderdale has inaugurated an occasional jazz concert series featuring nationally known musicians.

Miss Cleo repeatedly invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination on Wednesday as government lawyers asked her about a birth certificate that indicates she was born in Los Angeles to American parents and threatens to shatter her image as a mystical Jamaican. She also hinted that her signature accent that was in place Wednesday might be adopted. After months of resisting requests from the state Attorney General's Office to be interviewed, Miss Cleo, aka Youree Harris of Southwest Ranches, in Broward County, fielded questions for more than two hours.

Cleo Phillips wasn't on the ballot when the people of Dania voted for a police chief in 1936, but he still got the job. Mr. Phillips, who owned a repair garage at the time, won as a write-in candidate and became one of Dania's early pioneers. The city lost a part of its history on Thursday when Mr. Phillips died of lung problems in his Dania home. He was 87. "He was only a garage mechanic, but people liked him," said Vivian Phillips, his wife of 55 years. "He was fair and honest." Mr. Phillips also saw one of the most tragic moments in Broward County history.

By Michael D. Sorkin and Valerie Schremp St. Louis Post-Dispatch, October 3, 2002

The two Fort Lauderdale men accused of bilking consumers of $500 million through their Miss Cleo TV psychic operation flew to St. Louis on Wednesday, pleaded no contest to felony fraud, were sentenced and flew home after their corporations paid a $50,000 fine. Steven L. Feder, 52, was on probation for less than an hour without ever leaving a courtroom. Then a judge ruled that, his fine paid, he had satisfied his probation and was free to go. His cousin, Peter Stolz, 54, got a longer probation: The judge gave him a maximum of two years.

Tropical Storm Ernesto looks ragged now, but other storms have emerged from the mountains of eastern Cuba in a battered state, only to bulk up and clobber South Florida. Hurricane Cleo hit Miami on Aug. 27, 1964, as a Category 2 hurricane with 100 mph winds. Less than a day earlier, it had come off the coast of Cuba as a tropical storm. On Sept. 24, 1998, Hurricane Georges, which was once a Category 4 storm, emerged from Cuba as a minimal hurricane with winds of 75 mph. The next afternoon, it slammed Key West with winds of 105 mph, a Category 2 hurricane.

A Palm Beach County Circuit Court judge Monday denied motions to grant a new trial or to allow jurors to reconsider their recommendation of the death penalty for convicted double murderer Cleo LeCroy. In rejecting defense attorney Jim Eisenberg`s motions, Judge Carl Harper said the evidence presented at a trial in March against LeCroy was overwhelming. Later Monday, Harper ordered the county to pay attorney Michael Dubiner $1,500 for costs incurred in his defense of Cleo`s brother, Jon LeCroy, who was acquitted on murder and robbery charges in April.

The two brothers forever will be associated with a crime that left Palm Beach County aghast -- the 1981 slaying of a young Miami couple camping east of Belle Glade. The younger brother went to Death Row. The other was acquitted of the killings, walking out of the county courthouse a free man. More than 17 years after a jury cleared Jon LeCroy of murdering Gail and John Hardeman, he took the witness stand this month in an appeal of his brother's death sentence. What Jon LeCroy said that day was either the startling admission of a murderer whose teenage brother Cleo LeCroy took the fall for his crime or a desperate lie by someone trying to stop a family member's execution.